So it’s a 30% tax on the digital economy? The first iPhone didn’t even have an App Store, it can be a viable business without all this.
I get that the article called it a tax, but Apple isn't a state, they respond to market pressures, if people don't like it they can do business elsewhere.
The argument completely falls apart when you consider that Windows devs don't need to pay Microsoft a per-unit sale tax, beyond paying for Visual Studio Enterprise licenses (which are completely optional; there's many other IDEs). Microsoft charging devs for Windows APIs would be nonsensical.
Running the App Store is just a cost of doing business. Again, nobody forced Apple to. It benefits them tremendously, and benefits users as well. Why gouge devs?
No different than the iPhone itself. Apple has already paid for the iPhone out of their coffers before you buy it. Your purchase is nothing more than another source of revenue that replenishes those coffers. It is just a colloquialism to say that the money you spent was to pay for the iPhone, as it is for Xcode in this case.
in a pedantic sense sure, but in the real world no product that ignores the (affluent) 50% of mobile phone users has a chance in hell of surviving.